Spaceship Earth - Can we withstand the next 50 years?
*posted this here for both serious thoughts and otherwise...
The Population Explosion or the Population Bomb or the Population Exponential Equation of Doom - by hal-9000
Based on 200 years of statistical data, we may experience a threat worse than nuclear war. Below is from Wiki, a simple table :
Population
Year Billion
1804 1
1927 2
1959 3
1974 4
1987 5
1999 6
2011 7
What do you notice about the math? The world's population grows at a faster rate with each year. How many people can the Earth withstand? We don't know because the areas that suffer the worst and fastest growth are typically underdeveloped areas and countries. Most areas with the exception of developed Asian coastal areas, still have the geographical space to work with. What they don't have is the same access to food and medicine when compared to other parts of the world.
This population growth is attributed to advances in medicine, people becoming more informed/taking better care of their bodies, and generational genetics which simply means that each generation benefits from the two aforementioned factors. We witness an offshoot of this process every year when we see teens that are 6 feet tall with fully developed bodies, at younger ages. That's a direct result of genetics coupled with the type of foods we eat, medicinal advances. People are healthier out of the starting gate and that leads to longer lives, less chance of disease.
But how can that be if the world's fastest growth occurs in underdeveloped third world areas without access to these beneficial factors?
When looking at the world we divide it into the haves and have nots. I'm sure you've read some statistic or another saying that 5% of the world's population uses 75% of the resources, or similar. It is true unfortunately, although I don't suffer much guilt being part of the haves. We can't help or dictate where we're born, we can only change our location when we've become old enough to amass enough funds and/or skill to leave our original birthplace.
I do believe in cautionary tales featured both in literature and movies, illustrating the silent plague that is our ever growing population. To me, it's not a question of if, it's only a question of when. Simple math if you will. There are statistical counters showing how many people die in a minute and how many people are born. The born counter always has a larger number number than the death counter, and that counter keeps adding a stat, while knocking off a second, as we progress through the years.
Wait! There's good news! Biologists, geologists and other scientists estimate that every 25 million to 33 million years, that the Earth "purges" organic lifeforms from the planet and starts anew. These purges can be ice ages, excessive warming, tectonic plate shifting, meteor showers, disease, famine...it's a long list and some of the causes have nothing to do with Mother Earth..
So what do we do in the meantime? The data doesn't lie, we will have more and more passengers every year on this planet. Currently we're using resources faster than we're replenishing them. If you don't believe that last statement consider how long it takes to reseed and grow 100 acres of usable forest...decades. And then imagine how much lumber we chop down in one day worldwide... for uses like dwellings, construction, furniture, paper products...and that's only wood. Food is the resource that becomes worrisome and problematic.
Eugenics is a dark and dirty word. Yet some scientists believe that the Earth will have to enter this genetic lottery control method sometime in the next 2 decades. Other scientists think that it will take a restructuring of the entire population of the Earth. Everything from moving millions of people geographically, to taking away some of the 'have's daily portions...
Like most things in life...it's only a matter of time...
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Originally Posted by Hal-9000
